Cleaning

I recently made the observation to a friend that I did not believe that anyone who does not clean their own house or do their own laundry can appreciate what is means to be alive. Any sense of disembodied intellect is dented by cleaning a dirty bathroom or spot-cleaning stains on underwear. This grounding in reality is helpful in appreciating that we are mortal and fallible animals. 

The hands-on maintenance of my environment keeps me honest. It reminds that the vast majority of the world's human population work very hard. They get their hands dirty. While they may be exploited by the powerful, they are truly in touch with their humanity,  its limits and its potential. They are the bearers of basic human truths, basic truths of life as a living beings on a planet with limited resources. Without education, they can only cling to tradition to survive. With education, they are the beacons of positive change in the world. 

Those who are distanced from the basic labor of being, who live in glass towers in cement cities, are prone to mental corruption. They can live in their illusory world of delivered food and living spaces cleaned by 'the help'. They quickly lose touch with reality. They spout nonsense about climate change being a myth. They buy expensive gas-guzzling cars. They focus on making money because they think that will insulate them from the inevitable. 

As the basic labors of life lose their respectful place in the minds of the world's most privileged, the gap between them and the poor grows. Newt Gingrich says that the children of the poor should become janitors to work their way up to the top of the capitalist pig-pile he occupies. In other words, he feels that honest physical labor is for the stupid and the desperate. This thinking  represents the end result of alienation from the basic labors of living beings.

At the core of my humanist practice is my sense of responsibility to clean up my own messes. By doing the concrete maintenance of my life, I keep in practice to face the more abstract clean-ups. I understand that keeping my environment tidy facilitates keeping my mind tidy. I understand that the sweat of labor against muscle fatigue and gravity reminds me of my true mortal limitations. The humility which comes from this understanding helps me to maintain my respect for the mortal limitations of all human beings and all other living beings.